Interpersonal and Affective Facets and Items of the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) in Predicting Child Sex Offending*An earlier version of this study was presented at 2019 Annual Meeting of the American Society of Criminology.

Abstract

Psychopathy of child sex offenders in non-Western and Asian population is not frequently reported. The study examined psychopathic traits assessed by the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) in three groups of male offenders, child sex offender, adult sex offender, and nonsex offender groups. Out of 451 offenders included in the sample, 445 recidivated after a follow up of 11 years: 27 child sex offenders, 174 adult sex offenders, and 244 nonsex offenders. Adult sex offenders scored higher in four facets and total scores compared with nonsex offenders. Child sex offenders had more problems in interpersonal (facet 1) and affective (facet 2) traits than nonsex offenders. More specifically, child sex offenders scored higher in failure to accept responsibility (item 16, Cohen’s d = 0.80) and callous/lack of empathy (item 8, Cohen’s d = 0.59) of facet 2 and pathological lying (item 4, Cohen’s d = 0.58) and glibness/superficial charm (item 1, Cohen’s d = 0.48) of facet 1 than nonsex offenders. Both child sex offenders and adults sex offenders were found to be more psychopathic than nonsex offenders. While facets 1, 2, and 3 did not separate child and adult sex offending, child sex offenders scored significantly lower in antisocial problems (facet 4) than adult sex offenders. Despite the limitation of using a sample of mostly high-risk offenders, our findings indicate that higher PCL-R scores in specific facets (1 and 2) and items (1, 4, 8, and 16) are more predictive of child sex offending and suggest insight for treatment strategies of child sex offenders.

Self-report psychopathy-III facet scores predict sexual crimes, sexual preferences, and sexual deviance index validity more precisely than total scores

“…However, we have noticed that trends expected based on the literature apply to our sample. For instance, there is a near significant correlation between higher antisocial behavior facet scores and participants who offended against adults rather than minors ( r = 0.228, p = 0.004, Table 3 ), as has been previously reported ( Sohn et al, 2022 ). Additionally, a link has previously been established between antisocial traits (as can be measured by factor 2 and the antisocial behavior facet of the SRP-III) and committing a crime with contact ( Webb et al, 2007 ).…”

“…PCL-R scores from RPOs were higher on factor 2 and lower on factor 1, especially the interpersonal facet, than for the non-RPOs. Similarly, a study by Sohn et al (2022) found that child sex offenders scored higher on the interpersonal and affective facets of the PCL-R than nonsexual offenders, while there were no significant differences in their total scores. Both of these studies provide instances where the analysis of the PCL-R facet and factor scores have allowed for two groups of offenders to be distinguished, while their PCL-R total scores were not sufficient to draw the same distinctions.…”